Source: United States Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND)
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND), member of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, issued the following statement in response to the Biden Administration’s proposed methane venting and flaring rule:
“The Department of the Interior’s proposed rule is nothing more than another layer of unnecessary, duplicative bureaucracy designed to impair oil and gas production on Federal and tribal land. Democrats have tried this before and courts found it illegal. Rather than trotting out another punitive measure which will inevitably get caught up in litigation, the Biden Administration should use the authority they already possess from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to streamline permitting for gas gathering lines to reduce emissions. North Dakota producers already capture 95 percent of gas emissions, but operators on Federal land are impeded by the same cumbersome bureaucracy that’s now threatening to penalize them. I encourage North Dakotans to make their voices heard as the Department collects comments from the public.”
More than 30% of North Dakota’s minerals are split estate lands and Bakken oil is produced with along with rich gas streams. Because of burdensome red tape involved with permitting takeaway infrastructure on Federal and tribal lands, North Dakota faces significant takeaway capacity constraints and producers are often forced to flare the associated natural gas from oil production. Over one year ago, the Senate passed legislation to ease permitting requirements for gas capture infrastructure on Federal and applicable tribal lands. This authority remains unimplemented by the Department of the Interior (DOI).
The Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) rule covers emissions from oil and gas operations on Federal and Indian land. The proposed rule would establish new royalty on flared gas, monthly limits on allowable flaring, and new application requirements for operators to provide BLM information regarding their ability to capture produced natural gas before they can obtain a permit to drill.
Click here to read the rule.
Background:
In 2017, the House of Representatives introduced and passed H.J.Res.36 with bipartisan support. Then-Representative Cramer cosponsored the resolution, which would have overturned the Obama Administration’s venting and flaring rule, but it failed by one vote in the Senate. In July 2020, Senator Cramer denounced U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers’ ruling which reinstated the Obama Administration’s methane venting and flaring rule. Later that fall, a federal judge in Wyoming vacated the Obama Administration’s rule that overstepped air regulation legal boundaries, which are the state’s and Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) authority under the Clean Air Act. The methane rule also wrongly gave the federal government oversight over split estate lands, private or state surface lands with minerals beneath that the federal government claims.
Recently, Senator Cramer led 16 colleagues DOI Secretary Deb Haaland to implement provisions of the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) which streamlined permitting for oil and natural gas infrastructure. The IIJA gave DOI authority to categorically exclude certain energy-related infrastructure projects from the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) on public and applicable Indian lands to prevent wasteful venting or flaring of natural gas. To date, the Department has not responded to the senators’ concerns. Learn more here.
Senator Cramer also discussed the need for implementation of these provisions before EPA Administrator Michael Regan at a Senate Environment and Public Works hearing last April. The senator highlighted the poor methane capture rates on Federal and tribal lands in North Dakota compared to state and private lands. Learn more here.
“In the Bakken where we produce a lot of oil, natural gas is a byproduct so we do have some venting and flaring. The range of capture of natural gas from the Bakken oil production range from 56% to 94%. The good news is the state average is 93%. The 94% is all state and private land. The 56% to 83% is largely either tribal land or other Federal lands. We need to do better on Federal lands and Indian lands,” said Senator Cramer.
Since the hearing, North Dakota produced and marketed a record amount of natural gas in September while improving its statewide capture rate to 95% with highs of 96% across state and private lands while Federal and tribal lands had capture rates as low as 52%.